Category: News

Alpha, Beta, Sharpe and Information Ratio

ten-year returns

Image via Wikipedia

StockViz now had alpha, beta, Sharpe and information ratio values available for individual stocks. The calculations are done daily using 1 year’s worth of historical data.

“Alpha” is a measure of a manager’s skill by measuring the portion of the managers returns that are not attributable to “Beta”, or the portion of performance attributable to a benchmark. This is how “better” a stock is relative to owning the index (Nifty 50) outright.

“Beta” is similar to correlation. By definition, the market itself has a beta of 1.0. A stock whose returns vary more than the market’s returns has a beta whose absolute value is greater than 1. A stock whose returns vary less than the market’s returns has a beta with an absolute value less than 1.

The “Sharpe” ratio tells us whether a portfolio’s returns are due to smart investment decisions or a result of excess risk. The greater a portfolio’s Sharpe ratio, the better its risk-adjusted performance has been. A negative Sharpe ratio indicates that a risk-less asset would perform better than the security being analyzed.

“Information Ratio” relates the degree to which an investment has beaten the benchmark to the consistency with which the investment has beaten the benchmark.

Read the returns series here.

Holiday List 2011

Day

Date

Holiday

Wednesday

26 January 2011

Republic Day
Wednesday

2 March 2011

Mahashivratri
Tuesday

12 April 2011

Ram Navmi
Thursday

14 April 2011

Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Jayanti
Friday

22 April 2011

Good Friday
Monday

15 August 2011

Independence Day
Wednesday

31 August 2011

Ramzan Id
Thursday

1 September 2011

Shri Ganesh Chaturthi
Thursday

6 October 2011

Dassera
Wednesday

26 October 2011

Diwali Amavasya (Laxmi Pujan)
Thursday

27 October 2011

Diwali Balipratipada
Monday

7 November 2011

Bakri-Id
Thursday

10 November 2011

Gurunanak Jayanti
Tuesday

6 December 2011

Moharum